coronavirus

Construction site preparation works for the Edinburgh’s Trams to Newhaven project will start on Monday, 1 June 2020 in line with the Scottish Government’s Phase 1 pre-start site preparation.

Work on the project was stopped at the end of March to comply with Government guidance and to protect the safety of workers and residents during the coronavirus outbreak.

Following the First Minister’s announcement on 21 May of a phased return for construction sites, plans have been drawn up in line with Scottish Government safety guidelines and industry best practice to ensure the safety of workers and the public. At the briefing on 28 May the First Minister confirmed that site preparation could begin.

In advance of the main work beginning, works to prepare construction sites and project offices will include the introduction of infection control stations, additional water stations and toilet facilities for workers within the site and in the project office, and ensuring all office workspaces and facilities are set up appropriately. Other works on site will include the removal of the protective in-fill material that was used to ensure the work site remained safe and protected during the shutdown.

Measures to protect workers’ health will include daily briefings, continuous on-site inspections and health and safety ‘ambassadors.’ The numbers of workers on-site will be kept to a minimum and the majority of project office staff will continue to work from home.

Once the construction industry is given the approval to move to Phase 2, works on the existing sites will recommence and the Leith Walk construction site will be established as planned prior to site shutdown.

Any commencement of main works will be subject to the Scottish Government giving approval to move to Phase 2 of their construction guidelines which states: ‘soft start to site works (only where physical distancing can be maintained)’.

The project team has been working on plans to mitigate the impact of the enforced shutdown as a result of COVID 19 on the programme and budget. Despite the current circumstances the project continues to operate within its £207·3m budget. The project is paid for by borrowing monies that are repaid over a 30-year period through future revenues from customers.

If you have any queries please do not hesitate to get in contact

Regards

Chris Wilson

For information

The Scottish Government’s phased approach to construction details six key phases to ensure work is carried out in a safe way. These are:

Phase 0: Planning

Phase 1: Covid-19 Pre-start Site preparation

Phase 2: ‘Soft start’ to site works (only where physical distancing can be maintained)

Phase 3: Steady state operation (only where physical distancing can be maintained)

Notes of the Leith Harbour and Newhaven Community Council members-only meeting, held via Zoom on Tuesday 28 April 2020 at 7pm
Actions and decisions are red italic. Nem con means that no-one spoke or voted against an item.

I wanted to write to you to make you aware of our ongoing efforts to deal with the impact of Coronavirus on our city and our residents, and to give you further details of the support we’re providing in conjunction with our partners.

Alongside a substantial city-wide effort, we’ve been astounded by the goodwill and generosity of the people of Edinburgh to offer help and support in responding to the impact of covid-19 on our most vulnerable.

We’ll get through it together, and I know we’ll emerge stronger. Thank you all for the part you are playing.

Supporting the people of Edinburgh

Over the last six weeks, we’ve all had to manage the implications of Coronavirus on our lives. For many of us, this has meant a change in how we work and coping with the reality of home schooling. For some, it has also brought worry and anxiety about the health of our families or paying the bills and practical things like getting out to buy food and essential supplies.

During this time, teams across the Council has been helping residents with these challenges, be they at immediate physical risk from the virus due to an underlying health condition, or in need a bit of extra financial or practical support. We’ve also been supporting businesses and local groups at the heart of our communities with grants and access to local and national funding support. We’ve been working remotely around the clock to ensure that queries can still be dealt with and our residents continue to have points of contact

Early action

We strengthened our welfare and benefit teams to respond to the immediate need for financial advice and support and offered assurance that no council tenant need worry about losing their home during this crisis. The Council has processed over 4,600 applications for support and distributed nearly £600,000 in payments to date.

The Scottish Government wrote out to citizens already coping with serious or long-term illnesses, who are at greater risk from the virus, asking them to self-isolate. We stepped up an emergency team to provide support to people in this ‘shielding’ group who can’t get support from family or friends to help with essential food supplies and medicine deliveries. To date we’ve distributed over 1,600 food parcels and organised 87 pharmacy deliveries across the city.

As schools shut, we responded immediately to support families who needed help with the added costs of having children at home all day. Around £390,000 and over 5,000 food boxes have gone out to Edinburgh’s families so far with continuing support planned until the end of June.

We established five Council Resilience Centres across the city to offer critical support to people in vulnerable situations, while adhering to physical distancing measures. The centres support to people most at need in three critical situations of experiencing homelessness or serious/significant harassment, or in need of pre-arranged emergency cash payments.

We’re continuing to deliver as many frontline services as possible, but only if safe to do so. Services meeting the needs of vulnerable adults and children remain open and offering support. An up-to-date breakdown of our services and how they’re operating is available from our website www.edinburgh.gov.uk

Expanding our support network

As the crisis progresses, we know that more people will experience new and increased forms of vulnerability and need, many of whom will not previously have engaged with us before.

In addition to setting up the shielding support, we’ve made it as easy as possible to seek support through one team which processes all requests and makes sure the right support is available, advice given, or connections made.

Rather than seek to recreate local networks, we’ve entered into a funded agreement with key groups of local organisations through EVOC to enable food distribution and essential supplies to residents who are being affected by COVID 19.

We’ve made four school hubs available to support local food storage, packing and distribution with staff on the ground ready to work with our voluntary and third sector colleagues to get essential supplies out as quickly and efficiently as possible.

This support is now in operation and we’re taking over 100 calls a day, with requests for support being met within 48 hours, whether that be for essential food, medicine deliveries or other forms of support like dog walking or befriending.

Supporting community resilience

We know also that voluntary and local groups have stepped up local activity to provide a safety net of support for people who are finding they need help as a result of the crisis. Their support is wide-ranging, including mental health and wellbeing support for those who are struggling with isolation, targeted at young families and older people or people with disabilities. Some of these third sector/voluntary groups may be struggling with the financial consequences of increased demand, so we’ve established a team to support them to access Scottish Government funding and put in place a fund of small loans to help groups as they apply. We are aware that many community groups and third sector organisations in Edinburgh have already been successful in applying for funding from a range of grants.

Volunteering in the city

Alongside this substantial city-wide effort, we’ve been astounded by the goodwill and generosity of the people of Edinburgh to offer help and support in responding to the impact of covid-19 on our most vulnerable.

The power of being a good neighbour and reaching out to help friends and families has been invaluable. The everyday kindness and support being offered in communities across the city helps to meet the needs of the most vulnerable every bit as much as those who are on the front line. There are around 35 online peer-to-peer support groups currently operating, helping to connect people in need with people who can informally help. Volunteer Edinburgh produced a short video to encourage peer to peer neighbourliness and has guidance on being a good neighbour safely on their website www.volunteeredinburgh.org.uk/covid

Over 5000 people have volunteered to help either locally or via the national campaign and we’re working closely with Volunteer Edinburgh who are contacting every volunteer to match the skills and capacity with demand. This means ensuring the right checks and safeguards are in place before anyone can start, and while some may feel this process is frustrating, it’s important for the safety of our volunteers and the people they will help.

At the same time, we are re-aligning Council staff who are not able to carry out their normal role into critical roles, such as in care homes and waste services, to make sure we continue to keep essential services operating.

Sources of information and support

Main contact points are attached. We’re updating our coronavirus website section daily, so please check there regularly for new information. You’ll also find many resources which will help parents, carers, young people and families cope, home learning support, financial and debt advice, mental health support, and information on our services, to mention a few areas. Our contact us section also gives you the key contact points for key services.

Adam McVey
Leader
The City of Edinburgh Council

Useful contacts

During this difficult period, we’re experiencing significant pressures and need to prioritise services to provide support to those who need it most. We really appreciate your patience and support at this time. This information is correct as at 8 May 2020. Please check the contact us sectionwebsite for updates as we may have to make changes to our services at any time.

Vulnerable people

If you are over 70; have a disability; need support from mental health services; are pregnant; have dementia; receive a flu jab for health reasons; and/or don’t have online access to get information. Contact us during office hours if you need help. We are open Monday – Thursday 8.30 am – 5 pm, Friday 8.30 am – 3.40 pm. Telephone: 0131 200 2306 or email edinburghvulnerable@edinburgh.gov.uk

Shielded people

If you are shielding at home due to higher risk of severe illness from coronavirus, register for the SMS Shielding service – send text from your mobile phone to 0786 006 4525. The text you send should only include your CHI number.

If you don’t have a mobile call 0131 200 2388 or email shielding@edinburgh.gov.uk You will need your CHI number which is on the letter your received. The telephone line is open Monday – Thursday 8.30 am – 5 pm, Friday 8.30 am – 3.40 pm. If it’s an emergency, the out of hours team will respond on 0131 200 2000.

Council resilience centres

Five Council resilience centres have been established across the city. These are not open to the general public. Customers are asked to attend in person only if it is critical and you are experiencing homelessness, experiencing serious or significant harassment or collecting an agreed cash payment. The centres are located in:

Customer contact centre

To help with the efforts to limit the spread of coronavirus, we’re providing critical services and support only in our contact centre. This means we’ll be running an essential and emergency phone service to help our most vulnerable residents.

Emergency situations: Support for those most at risk and hardest hit by the coronavirus outbreak will be prioritised in all circumstances. If you’re experiencing an emergency or critical situation, please phone 0131 200 2000. Please only phone if the issue is urgent. Otherwise, if the service you wish to access isn’t available on our website, please email us and we’ll deal with your enquiry as soon as possible. You’ll find email addresses for our services below.

Council Tax, benefits and welfare

Due to the overwhelming demand we are continuing to support telephone contact, however, due to significantly reduced resources in our contact centre, our Council Tax and Benefits phone line will now be open Monday to Thursday 10am to 4pm, Friday 10am to 3pm.

If you need to speak to someone in the service as an emergency, please phone 0131 608 1111. We would request that all other contact is by email to income and benefits. We will come back to you promptly and are currently streamlining our service and resources to cope with current demand.

Council house repairs

For a short period of time, we are only able to carry out critical responsive repairs in Council homes. We have made this decision because it’s vital that we do everything we can to prevent the spread of coronavirus while at the same time we look after vulnerable people, protect staff from harm and maintain, as far as possible, essential services.

Critical responsive repairs will be carried out where there is a serious risk to health and safety, a serious risk to the structure of your home and/or your home is not secure.

To report an emergency repair please call 0131 200 2345. Please only report emergencies on this number – this will allow us to prioritise the most urgent repairs for our most vulnerable tenants.

Business support

Waste and environmental services

We’re working hard to keep our bin services running and have put plans in place to allow us to continue to run collections. Staff shortages mean that we need to prioritise some collections and there will be changes to your collections and our street cleaning services, including some services running late. Find out more about out waste and recycling service.

Please only phone us if the issue is dangerous and a threat to public safety 0131 200 2000.

Support for third sector/voluntary groups to apply for funding

Our team is supporting community projects and organisations who may need support to identify suitable funding and assist them to helping their communities with the Covid-19 crisis. This may be in the form of advice or assistance with a funding application. Email the support for grants team.

(adapted from an email from Leith Rotary, with apologies for taking a while to post this. LHNCC’s web-master has had a few too many personal commitments recently.)

Dear Friends

In view of our current difficulty in raising funds and, as many of you may know, Adam Robertson-Falk runs a Social Enterprise operating for the benefit of his staff, clients and the environment, working with fabrics to produce classic apparel. He has offered to produce non-medical Facemasks for us to sell to local charities, members of Rotary and members of the general public. The mask is a 3 layered face barrier with space for an additional filter layer and will be produced in Rotary blue with yellow stitching. Masks are washable at 40-60 degrees and should be washed after every wearing. We are selling these for the very reasonable price of £7.50 each to the public. All profits will be donated to local foodbanks and to other organisations supporting those in need at this time.

An order form, together with a picture of the mask, is here. On the order form please show the total number of masks you require and then send completed order forms to leithrotaryfacemasks@gmail.com. You can also use this e-mail address for any enquiries.

Given the unusual nature of the circumstances we are in, we are doing our best for the Community Council and also the best in our responsibility to deliver upon our commitment to the community which we serve.

Because LHNCC is currently learning how to conduct meetings online, this will be a members-only ‘discussion’ meeting.

Increase in people using off-road paths and parks

Since restrictions were introduced to help manage the coronavirus outbreak, there’s been an increase in people using the city’s network of paths, as well as parks, as part of their daily exercise and for travelling to work or local amenities – with up to five times their normal use.

Data up to week five of lockdown shows increases on the Union Canal towpath, with 17% growth in pedestrian numbers at Harrison Park, whilst cycling numbers have grown by 76% at Wester Hailes. On the North Edinburgh Path Network at Rodney St, pedestrian numbers have grown by 14%, cycling numbers by 32%. At certain times of the week, especially weekends, much bigger increases have been recorded.

While it’s great that the routes are popular and well-used, we want to make sure that everyone can undertake and enjoy their daily exercise and travel in safety and comfort.

Paths for everyone code of conduct

The campaign will direct people to the Paths for Everyone section of the Council’s webpages, where we hope to be able to display information such as busy routes/times, coming from our pedestrian/cycle counter data. This aims to encourage people to use alternative routes if they can, or exercise at a less busy time. Smarter Choices, Smarter Places funding for this project is gratefully received from Paths for All.

About the campaign

Temporary signage (example on the right: click the thumbnail to see the full-size image) will be rolled out this week, starting on the active travel network entry points, and signage in the parks will follow. We will be running a complementary social media campaign also, and we would really appreciate your support with sharing this content amongst your followers and networks.